Silent Leges Inter Arma present themselves as “modern European black metal” and these Germans show on their debut album the way to a new wave of black metal.

Let me expand on that: Silent Leges Inter Arma is an album that sounds like battle hymns, cries of pain in wartimes and a good shot of tr00 and kvlt black metal. The “modern” part comes in the use of elements from death metal, post rock and acoustic folk music.

While the album opens with “We Are”, a typical black metal track including tremolos, heavily distorted vocals and blast drums, Silent Leges Inter Arma have more to offer than “just” black metal.

“Falcon-headed One”, for example borrows from doom metal and post rock and the slowly pumping and grooving riffs in the middle part together with the atypical shouts, make it an interesting and diverse track to listen to.

The 3rd track on Silent Leges Inter Arma “I Will Hunt You Down” combines black and death metal, while “Beyond The Light” takes the death metal influence further, with elements of early Dark Tranquillity and At The Gates showing up in their deeply melodic approach.

After a brief acoustic intermezzo “Shades”, “For The Dead” could be classified as pagan metal, with Primordial as main similarity. In the 11-minute long “Wings” Silent Leges Inter Arma show that they can effortlessly float between musical styles, resulting in their best work of this album. The outro of the album “In Shadows Again” is a commemorative acoustic track again, very different from the aggressive opening of the album.

Silent Leges Inter Arma are a young, fresh black metal band, of whom I appreciate their cross-over moments to post rock. Sadly enough, the production and mixing of the album is sloppy, which results in dusty bass and rusty drum sounds. This band deserves better.

If you are interested in exploring new sounds in black metal, check out the album teaser: